1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to connectors for electronic devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
Today, consumer electronic devices, such as personal computers, personal digital assistants, mobile telephones, and portable media players, often utilize one or more electrical connectors. These electrical connectors facilitate electrical connection with other devices, such as host computers, accessory devices, data networks, etc.
Since many consumer electronic device are portable and small, there is a desire to make the electrical connectors small. Unfortunately, in many cases, these electrical connectors are required to support a substantial number electrical contacts (e.g., 30 pins) within a constrained space. Moreover, conventional techniques for assembly of electrical connectors, particularly those having a substantial number of electrical contacts, is tedious, error prone and time consuming. Assembly of a system having such an electrical connector is also problematic because the electrical connector is manually attached (e.g., soldered) to the system's circuit board during assembly, which can require each of the substantial number of electrical contacts be individually soldered to the system's circuit board.
Thus, there is a need for improved approaches to assembling connectors and/or systems using connectors.